French Flanders: From Laventie to Neuve Chapelle Part Eight – Rue-du-Bacquerot No.1 Military Cemetery

Spot the Cross of Sacrifice.

A Cross of Sacrifice between two tall poplar trees,…

…and I am guessing that if we continue off to the left, past this barn,…

…we might find a way to get closer.  Hardly picturesque, that’s for sure, and there are too many of these rather utilitarian farm buildings now on Belgian farms replacing the old wooden ones, which is not good for wildlife.  Not good at all.  Mind you, before I get too off-subject, where exactly have those poplar trees on either side of the Cross gone?

The mystery, if such it is, is solved as we get closer, because we have two Crosses here, of decidedly different sizes,…

…and what you might assume to be two cemeteries divided by this cobbled walkway.  Most curious.

However, the fact that the cemetery name…

…is split on both sides of the pathway suggests otherwise,…

…and indeed this is just one cemetery, despite the cobbles, and the presence of a Cross of Sacrifice in both halves.  I can think of an example where two cemeteries are separated by a road, yet only one has a Cross of Sacrifice (Anzac Cemetery & Sailly-sur-la-Lys Canadian Cemetery), and yet here we have a single cemetery with two Crosses, and off the top of my head I can think of only one other; Brookwood Military Cemetery in Surrey.

Peeking over the wall on our right, there are a considerable number of graves on this side,…

…and comparatively few on this side,…

…as is clear from this view looking back at the two halves of the cemetery from the adjoining field.

There are three different-sized Crosses used in CWGC cemeteries, as I’ve shown you more than once before, depending on the cemetery size,…

…and this is the smallest version, and as we shall see over on the other side of the cemetery, the second Cross is considerably bigger.

The final burials to be made in this cemetery – and when I say ‘this cemetery’ I am referring to both sections – are to be found here, where these two rows make up Plot III.  The last burial made in the larger section of the cemetery, across the walkway, was on 10th March 1917, and the first over here, at the far end of Row A, the long row, five days later on 15th March.

Eleven of the burials in Row A are men of the King’s Own Yorkshire Light Infantry, and all sixteen men in the row were killed between mid-March & mid-April 1917.

The smaller Row B, with just five burials,…

…contains, closest to the camera, the grave of a Royal Engineer sapper who died in April 1917, and two more KOYLI men, both May 1917 casualties, these the final men killed in 1917 buried in either section of the cemetery.  After which there were no further burials other than two Germans killed in April 1918 in Plot II, across the walkway, and two British soldiers, seen furthest from the camera here, who died in the autumn of 1918.

The origins of the cemetery start with the Indian Corps, who began using this field for their dead in November 1914, and among the headstones beyond the dividing wall are those of the earliest casualties to be found here.

I refrain from saying ‘burials to be found here’ because the first six rows are all Hindu cremations, the first row, Row F, consisting of these two headstones on the left,…

…both men of the 6th Jat Light Infantry who died of wounds, Sepoy Manha (left) on 3rd May 1915, and Jamadar Badlu Singh I, on 29th January 1915,…

…and the three headstones seen here on the far right (and below).  All these Indian casualties, incidentally, are a split of original & concentration, as I will show you later.

The headstone on the left is that of an unknown Hindu soldier of the 9th Gurkha Rifles, in the centre, Jemadar Dalu Thapa, 3rd Queen Alexandra’s Own Gurkha Rifles, who was killed in action on 2nd May 1915, and on the right, Rifleman Kharka Bahadur Rana 8th Gurkha Rifles, who died on 17th April 1915.  A jemadar, by the way, was a junior Indian officer belonging to a locally raised native regiment serving in another army, in this case the British Army.  As they were being paid, of course, does that make them mercenaries?

Behind, the five remaining Hindu rows contain fifty eight cremations, of which seventeen are of unidentified men (making eighteen unidentified Hindus in total).  The headstone in shadow on the far right…

…and seen on the left here is inscribed with ‘The following Hindu soldier of the Indian Army is honoured here’, followed by the soldiers’ name, as are quite a number of these headstones.  Havildar Nain Sing Gharti, 2nd King Edward’s Own Gurkhas (although spelt Goorkhas on the headstone), was killed in action on 25th September 1915, and Rifleman Santbir Sunwar, Burma Military Police, attd. 9th Gurkha Rifles, died on 28th June 1915.

Two sepoys and two lance naiks in Row C, all August 1915 casualties.  From left: Sepoy Jodha, 74th attd. 69th Punjabis, killed in action on 2nd August, Lance Naik Santa, 41st Dogras, and Sepoy Kirpa, 38th attd. 41st Dogras, both killed in action on 10th August, and Lance Naik Tir Sing Sahi, 9th Gurkha Rifles, killed in action on 11th August 1915.  The first three headstones also bear the inscription ‘The following Hindu soldier of the Indian Army is honoured here’.

At the other end of the same row, the final headstone is that of ‘A Hindu Soldier of the Great War, 2/39th Gharwal Rifles’, another of the unidentified men in the plot.

Most of the unidentified men are to be found in Row A, which contains fourteen unknown men and just a single identified soldier, Rifleman Thel Sing Negi, 39th Gharwal Rifles, who was killed on 7th February 1915, and whose name adorns the headstone closest to us.  He was once buried in Vielle Chapelle Old Military Cemetery; whether the other men in the row were also once buried there is impossible to say, there being no forms for these men (as explained, using different examples, a few posts back).

The Sikh Plot consists of three rows of burials (actually, more likely cremations, but either would be acceptable), in which only eleven men are identified.  Four of the burials in Row C, in the foreground, are identified, but Row B behind contains only unidentified men,…

…three pictured here, two with the inscription ‘An Unknown Indian Soldier of the Great War’, the headstone on the right inscribed with ‘A Sikh Soldier of the Great War, 57th Pioneers, Indian Army’.

The identified Sikh soldiers’ headstones are all inscribed with ‘The following Sikh soldier of the Indian Army is honoured here’ above the name.  These three sepoys died in the summer of 1915.  From left: Sepoy Khazan Singh, 58th Vaughan’s Rifles (Frontier Force), attd. 82nd Punjabis, killed in action on 15th August 1915, Sepoy Dasaunda Singh, 35th, attd. 47th Sikhs, killed in action on 5th July 1915, and Sepoy Indar Singh, 35th, attd. 47th Sikhs, killed in action on 28th June 1915.  The next headstone in the row, incidentally (a failure on the photography front), is that of a Sikh soldier originally buried in Euston Post Cemetery, which is where Part Two of our tour will begin, when we eventually get there

The final three rows are the Mussulman (Muslim) Plot, and all are burials as cremation is prohibited.  The cemetery plan* (click to view) does indeed spell Mussulman with two ‘u’s & an ‘a’,…

*personally, I much prefer my ‘cobbled walkway’ to the cemetery plan’s ‘paved track’.

…as opposed to the words inscribed on a few of the thirty two headstones in the plot, ‘A Mussalman Soldier of the Great War’.  Note the different spelling.  The majority of the men buried in the plot are identified, although six of the burials in Row C are unidentified (above & below).  The identified man on the far right above is Sepoy Munshi, 57th Wilde’s Rifles (Frontier Force), who was killed in action on 29th November 1914.

If you look behind the centre headstone,…

…there’s a headstone with an unusual emblem, that of an unknown soldier of the 9th Bhopal Infantry – apologies for the lack of a close-up.  I have absolutely no idea why he, alone of all the men in this Indian section of the cemetery, has a regulation CWGC headstone.  Please, would someone explain it to me?

Stone of Remembrance,…

…and the view looking down the Indian Plot,…

…from either side.  The best way to show you which of these burials are original burials, and which are concentrations,…

…is to show you this coloured extract from the cemetery plan, original burials in green, and concentration burials in pink.

Lying just outside the cemetery wall, these look like old pieces of elephant iron to me – although elephant iron is not really the correct term, as you will find out, with patience, here.

Time to head back to the entrance of this section of the cemetery,…

…and cross over to the larger section,…

…although on the way…

…we have a memorial to pay our respects at.

This memorial panel, referred to as the Indian Memorial Tablet on the cemetery plan, contains twelve names, all men killed between February & September 1915, whose bodies were subsequently lost.

Ten of them are listed here,…

…their original burial site being Rue des Chavattes Indian Graveyard, as shown here,…

…and the final two are listed here, these men once buried in Edward Road Cemetery No. 2.  Neither of these cemeteries exist today.

A minor point, perhaps, but the CWGC text on their website says the following about the Indian graves in this cemetery ‘Nineteen of the Indian graves were brought in from Rue-des-Chavattes Indian Cemetery, Lacoutre.’  Well, they weren’t.  It was actually Rue des Chavattes Indian Graveyard, as we have seen, and as the Concentration of Graves forms (click to enlarge) for those nineteen men show.

Back past the KOYLI burials in Plot III,…

…to the Cross of Sacrifice,…

…after which we find ourselves – this shot proving that I failed to photograph the entrance – in the larger part of the cemetery, which consists of eleven long rows of neat, widely-spaced headstones split into just two plots, those this side of the Cross of Sacrifice, and those beyond.

Which makes it very difficult to photograph in any kind of coherent way and still retain your interest, because pretty much any picture looks pretty much like any other.  We’ll see how it goes, but with due respect, this section of the cemetery is likely less interesting than the Indian plot to the casual visitor, although not, of course, to the relatives of those buried here.

The burials in this part of the cemetery are all original and in general the men are buried chronologically, the section used regularly between early November 1914 & February 1917, with only half-a-dozen burials, including two Germans, made thereafter.  Thus the earliest burials, two dozen men who died in November & December 1914, along with a few 1915 casualties, are mainly to be found in Plot I Rows A & B, Row C continues the 1915 burials, and so on.  And, in general, Plot II, when we get there, is much the same, Rows A & B containing mainly 1915 burials along with a handful of 1914 casualties, Row C a single 1914 casualty alongside mainly late summer 1915 burials, and so on.  All of which is not quite as straightforward as it seems.  Is it ever?  Anyway, as we head towards the northern corner beyond the final rows of Plot I, passing the first of a number of double headstones, on the right, to be found here,…

…these two Cameron Highlanders killed in March 1915 sharing a single grave in Row D,…

…I’d better explain further.

These two rows are, quite clearly, the final rows of Plot I, Row K,  on the left, and Row J closest to the camera.  As you know, most cemeteries do not have a Row I, to avoid any confusion with the number ‘1’, so if we turn to our right we would expect to find Row H next,…

…and indeed we do, Royal Warwickshire Regiment casualties from June 1916 at the start of the row.  And then you’d presume that the next row is Row G, followed by Row F, and so on.  Not a bit of it.  The second row in this shot is Row A, beyond which is Row B, and so on until we get to Row G.  The cemetery plan shows all, including the fact that beyond Row G there is one more row, Row L, and so, and this applies to both Plot I & Plot II, we have rows in the following order; L, G, F, E, D, C, B, A, H, J & K.  All a bit tricky for visitors, I’d have thought.

Back to Plot I Row K, looking towards the cemetery entrance in the background, the cemetery’s north-eastern boundary behind us, the centre headstone here, a German killed in July 1916,…

…listed here, one of seven German graves in total in the cemetery,…

…with another, this man killed in November 1914, by far the earliest of the German burials, nearby.

Two more Royal Warwickshires in Plot I Row H, both killed on 2nd July 1916, along with a man of the 2nd London Regiment who died in December 1916 on the left.  On the right of this shot you can see three of the double headstones in Rows A & B,…

…the same three double headstones, all 1914 burials, seen here again on the right, as we look north along Row C, the burials in the row nearly all from the early months of 1915.  Actually, this is a good time to show you what I mentioned earlier, because if we pan to our right,…

…past the Cross of Sacrifice,…

…this is Plot II Row C, the view an almost mirror image of Plot I, the majority of the burials in this row from the autumn of 1915.

The final headstones of Plot I Row K, and a Cross of Sacrifice that is considerably bigger than the one we saw earlier.

Plot II Rows H, closest to the camera, J & K.  The burials in these three rows – and remember that the next row, out of shot to the left, is, like Plot I, Row A, followed by Row B and so on – include the final burials made on this side of the cemetery; as we’ve seen, the next burials would be across the cobbled walkway in Plot III.

The burials in Row K, now at the front,…

…are almost all from London regiments, the men killed between October 1916 & February 1917,…

…those in Rows J & H behind all men killed in July 1916 except a single burial, that of a man of the York & Lancaster Regiment added to this end of Row H in March 1917.  His headstone, its edge glistening in the sun, can be seen above the second headstone from the left in the foreground, and he was the final burial made in this larger part of the cemetery.  This view looks north west from close to the cemetery’s eastern corner.  Behind us,…

…there’s another little structure with a map on the wall and a seat for a rest,…

…and you may have noticed a wreath left at the base of a headstone in Row J in the earlier shots of the plot, and such things always attract my attention,…

…because I know that someone else has stood here, with likely far stronger emotions than mine.  Private Joseph Batty, York & Lancaster Regiment, was twenty eight when he was killed on 17th July 1916.

Three Seaforth Highlanders, earlier casualties from August 1915, in Row B.

Looking north towards the Cross,…

…and panning left, now looking north west along Row F, the cemetery entrance in the far left background.  Part of Row G can be seen on the left,…

…this end of the row – these burials from June 1916 – abutting the western boundary wall near the southern corner,…

…this view showing the same row from the other end.  The two German headstones peeking out behind the first British headstones…

…are the two identified April 1918 burials, a gefreiter and an unteroffizier, we saw on the earlier form.  Who actually buried them is not documented, but their dates of death, 14th & 27th April 1918, and the fact that there is no mention that they are concentration burials*, suggests that these men were buried by their own comrades.

*Of course there isn’t.  Because they wouldn’t have been concentrated here.

Plot II Row F, the burials within mainly from the early months of 1916,…

…the first headstone of which is now on the right as we look straight down the centre of this section of the cemetery.

Plot I Row G, and as I explained, and the cemetery plan shows you,…

…the last row, alphabetically, in Plot I is Row L, along the boundary wall here, the German grave one of the three unidentified soldiers listed on the earlier form.

Row G, in the foreground, Row L behind, the cemetery entrance (best shot you’re going to get) far right, and a marker denoting a headstone removed to be replaced by a brand new one.  Three graves from the end of Row L,…

…this man served under an alias.

Now here’s where the lack of a picture of the cemetery entrance comes back to haunt me, as not only did I fail to take a shot from outside,…

…you will have gathered by now that I also failed to take one from here, too.  So, whereas normally I would show you the cemetery entrance from the inside at this point, maybe a picture of the visitor’s book, maybe, over the years, Baldrick adding his ‘X’ to the list of pilgrims, here you get just a tease of the entrance, as the edge of the flower bed angles away off to our right,…

…and we leave.

I did take this picture as we made our way back to the car, looking over the wall at the Indian Plot.  There may be two Crosses of Sacrifice here, but this, you may have realized, is the only Stone of Remembrance.  Next, we must travel further west, a little less than a mile, until we reach the main road from Estaires, on the River Lys, to La Bassée to the south, where the final cemetery in the first half of this tour – actually the furthest from the front lines on our route, and also the largest – awaits.